Did You Know…There Is
a University HELPLINE?
For Compliance Questions or Concerns,
Call 1-877-694-2ASK top
Did you know there is a resource
to ask about University policies or procedures, or to raise
confidential concerns about business practices? Call the University’s
HELPLINE and assistance will be provided.
In July 2001, the University rolled out a
Confidential Compliance HELPLINE (1-877-694-2ASK) to help the
Harvard community with questions or concerns they may have about
the University’s policies, procedures, and business practices.
The HELPLINE is a resource designed to make getting information
easy. The University recognized that in a large, decentralized
workplace, it is often challenging for employees to get the
information they need to do their job.
The HELPLINE is equipped to handle a variety of inquiries through
resources across the University, including outreach to schools
and departments. The HELPLINE may address everything from regulatory
compliance to business policy or conduct questions. For example:
- What are the University’s military leave benefits and to
whom do they apply?
- What is a reasonable accommodation if I have a disability?
- What should I do if I think I have a financial conflict of
interest?
- What if I am asked to process departmental expenses that
do not have an associated business purpose?
The University encourages its employees to
call for two reasons. First, the University values doing the
right thing. Employees should be proactive and seek guidance
when they are unsure about University policies and practices.
Second, the University supports responsible stewardship. Employees
should be accountable for their actions and be able to support
their business decisions. If an employee is confronted with
an issue that raises concerns about business practices, they
should phone the HELPLINE.
The HELPLINE is active 24 hours a day; employees
can call anytime or from anywhere. The HELPLINE has a confidential
voicemail box that will store the caller’s message. The caller
will be asked to leave their name, telephone number, and a brief
description of the nature of their call.
The HELPLINE will respond to calls within
two or three business days. First, the HELPLINE will contact
the caller and request further information. The HELPLINE will
then either directly answer the caller’s question or refer it
to the appropriate person within the University. The HELPLINE
strives to maintain the confidentiality of all calls.
Expect a New Greeting
When You Call the Help Desk top
Beginning on Wednesday, March 12, you will
hear a new greeting when you call the UIS Help Desk (6-2001)
and the other telephone numbers it supports (for example, the
Paycheck, PIN, PCard, Network Operations Center, and Desktop
& LAN Support hotlines).
Why? The Help Desk is installing a new automatic
call distributor (ACD), which will help route calls and voicemail.
Callers will hear new menu options and be prompted for their
Harvard ID, if they have one. Entering a Harvard ID via the
telephone keypad will enable the Help Desk to more accurately
record who is calling and provide faster service. You may also
hear an estimated wait time and be offered the option to leave
a message for a call back if all the Help Desk analysts are
already on a call.
Payroll-Related News
Items top
| News
Item |
Details |
| The payroll closings
calendar for the next quarter is now available. |
The payroll / time and labor closings
calendar for April to June, 2003 is now available at:
http://atwork.harvard.edu/hradmin/
related_docs/pay_calendar.pdf.
It lists deadlines for the submission
of personnel actions, and for time entry and approval.
It also shows the scheduled windows for payroll processing
and confirmation, and paydays. |
| The state tax withholding
deduction in PeopleSoft has been corrected. |
When new tax rates took effect on January
1, 2003, we incorrectly set the Massachusetts standard
deduction at $3,300 instead of $2,300. This error was
corrected February 16, so that all paychecks issued after
that date will have the correct amount withheld.
As a result, most employees can expect to see between
$1 and $3 more in Massachusetts state tax withheld on
their paychecks, depending on their salary level. (Correcting
the standard deductions increased the withholding, as
it made more of an employee’s earnings subject to taxation.)
Employees are not likely to be significantly under-withheld
for 2003, because the difference was small and corrected
early in the year. |
|
The appearance of employee paychecks when viewed
online in PeopleSoft has changed.
|
Harvard’s application of a tax-related
software update provided by PeopleSoft slightly changed
the screen appearance of employee paychecks in Employee
Self-Service beginning Saturday, March 8.
The same information will be displayed,
but the arrangement of data on the screen and the column
widths are slightly different. Note that even advices
for prior pay periods will display in this new format
when viewed online. The
navigation path to get to your online paystub remains
the same: Home > Self Service > Employee
> View > View Paycheck.
|
AWS3 Update top
The Administrator’s WorkStation
3, the Brio-based reporting application used to produce HR
management reports, has recently graduated from its early
release in “beta” to a “production” application. For users,
this will mean faster report results and regular releases
of new reports.
Report run time:
At this writing, there are twenty reports available in AWS3,
all but one of which have a run time of five minutes or less
(fourteen have now been tuned to run in under a minute). This
represents a 50% improvement in report run time. If you are
still experiencing long run times, your report parameters
may not be set to "constrain" your search sufficiently.
If you need AWS3
training or wish to attend a hands-on lab, contact your
local
training liaison to register. If you have already been
to training and still need help, contact your local HR office
or the Help Desk at 6-2001.
In addition to performance
improvements, two new reports have been added
recently to AWS3: the Departmental Job Profile report and
the Multiple Jobs report.
The Departmental Job
Profile report lets a user look up job information
for active employees in their department as of a certain date.
The data in this report is useful for viewing current job,
compensation, or demographic information at the department
level.
The Multiple Jobs
report lets users view basic job information for employees
with more than one active job at the University. This data
is useful in gathering accurate counts of employees with multiple
jobs or for determining which employees in your department
currently hold another position at Harvard.
“Bug” warning:
We recently discovered a Brio bug affecting all AWS3 reports.
If you use the Delete key to clear the contents of a field,
Brio does not erase it. If you use Backspace, it does. This
is annoying but not fatal. The report parameter page shows
the parameter values that were actually used, including the
ones that didn't really erase. Those who use the lookup functions
rather than typing in values will not see this problem, because
the lookups correctly populate the fields.
Also of note:
A logout button has been added to AWS3 that you should use
to exit the system (rather than just closing your browser
window). This will better protect the security of sensitive
HR data and reports you may have run during your online session.
About the e-News
top
The Financial Administration
publishes this semimonthly electronic newsletter for users of
Harvard University's financial, HR, and reporting systems, policies,
and procedures. Generally, the e-News is published on or around
the 12th and 26th of each month.
It contains:
- updates on projects underway to build
or improve University administrative systems;
- information about new University
policies, procedures, and forms;
- reminders about upcoming deadlines
and cut-over dates;
- tips and tricks for working more
easily or productively.
We welcome questions and
suggestions for improvement from readers. If your questions
are of general interest, we will answer them in future issues.
Please send comments, questions,
or suggestions for improvement by email to us at: fad_communications@harvard.edu
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